Askia=Awesome

[El Caballerion]

So I've played around 4-5 games of CIV V so far (marathon on KING difficulty), with a handful of different CIVS. So far, most of my games have been lackluster, usually ending with me completely broke with 20 unhappy citizens around the industrial age.

Until I started a game with Askia . His bonuses (triple amount of $$$ after destroying barbarian encampments) are amazing and really allow for early era rushes. All you have to do is keep a hidden pocket of land next to your territory from being settled and just attack any encampments that come up. By the Renaissance age, I had 30 happy citizens and a whole lot of money, mainly from buying coliseums and other happiness/wealth generating buildings (not to mention his unique mud mosque building adds +5 culture and has no maintenance). I'm definitely going to keep playing with him in the long haul.

Anybody else have a favorite CIV or strategy? Why?

 

[Kronpas]

Chinese, for their never ending supply of great general +45% str bonus. Japanese, for the music theme and bushido code: fight @ full str till death!

Roman with +20% production for every building already built in Rome is awesome too. For a small sum of maint. cost, your whole empire got a free factory each city :|

 

[Stormbolt]

The English are my favorite. Sun Never Sets is pretty useful, and Ships of the Line and Longbowmen are hax. I haven't tried Askia yet, but he looks interesting to play as.

 

[sarah_aus]

Thanks for the advice, I shall play him tomorrow and see what it's like

I don't have a fave just yet, I've Just been playing them all to see what they offer.

 

[CrimsonEdge]

My first game was with him and... yeah, he's a really great leader.

I didn't use his unique building, as I forgot about it, but it seems pretty decent as well!

Really enjoyed him. He may be my favorite.

 

[Thry]

The English are my favorite. Sun Never Sets is pretty useful, and Ships of the Line and Longbowmen are hax. I haven't tried Askia yet, but he looks interesting to play as.

wait wat

 

[eoc]

In civ5, I think India is the most powerful, which is based on its trait ---- decrease unhappy of population and city numbers. It works awefully at larger map.

 

[Johan de Witt]

Anyone who tried Montezuma?

Is the culture after battle any good?

 

[KAuss]

I unno I play marathon too and walked my latest king game... I've used Japan which is pretty useless because the AI is not going to give you a challenge. Then I used Rome and rush buy all buildings in capital to gain bonus while cap keeps building wonders... Worked great until I found out not building buildings worked better, so Rome has a wasted skill.

Then I used Iroqouis and must say they have it pretty good. You almost always start in a good tree filled spot away from the tundra, and you save money on roads. All your units gain bonus move in friendly jungles making moving of units less of a hassle. The extra bonus hammer from long house let me make a 45 hammer city as well. With a second 38 hammers one. The 45 isnt even the capital.

The special unit isnt all that great but once again combat is a cake walk regardless so no biggie. Barb money is nice but money for me has never been a problem. With aim for resource, gpt from other civs make it a non issue.

Iroquois is so much fun because of the high hammer cities.

 

[ChaplainDMK]

wait wat

Sun never sets is nice on more islandy maps, you can realy get your navy to places fast.
I had my huge force of battleships, destroyers and carriers across the map in 5-7 turns (standard map) pounding enemy civs into dust before my army arrived

 

[Dave_Oz]

Anyone who tried Montezuma?

Is the culture after battle any good?

Yes, but extra gold from barbarians with Askia is alot better in my opinion, money is more valuable then culture.

Also the Songhai unique unit, a knight that gets an attack bonus on citys, is much better, it comes at a time you wanna expand into other civs city too.

 

[shihuacao]

Anyone who tried Montezuma?

Is the culture after battle any good?

Upgrade your Jaguar and you will end with elite Swordman/Long Swordman/Rifles that heals with every unit killed, a few of them alone can wipe out entire continent, to kill without any rest.

 

[KAuss]

France is better than Aztec purely because you don't have to work to get the extra culture... Not only that, but if you have no dark spots on your side of the map you won't get much barbs to fight...

Culture is not that useful starting out, a few K worth of gold is better because you can purchase land... However, policies are important too, that's why Stonehenge is almost always worth shooting for... Even better than Oracle IMO...

Some civs like Iroquois need forests to be friendly to take advantage of the map, so the extra culture helps there to let you rush buy other things with that money...

I think my next civ to play with will be Egypt... I can already see them being OP because 33% on wonders will mean more than hammers from Iroquois, and their special building is free of charge and earn you even more culture for land grab and early policy...

If the game ever picks up on AI, I think English is for sure going to be the most popular because longbows are IMBA... And the best melee unit IMO has to be Companion Horseman from Greece...

Can't wait till the game puts up a challenge so all these talks mean something lol...

 

[lynxxyarly]

I've enjoyed bismark a lot. I seem to get really lucky and just mass troops early and not even have to build troops to protect. I just amass the brutes and subsequent archer/spearmen early that I gain from barbs and
Destroy everyone who still has like 1 to 2 warriores and maybe an archer

 

[KAuss]

Do brutes cost gold to upkeep and can they upgrade to anything?

 

[Kiwi Tyrant]

Anyone who tried Montezuma?

Is the culture after battle any good?

Yeah, got a chessy Dom Victory with him on small continent's/emperor.
All I can say is that their unique culture havesting is situational (on island's it's useless). Compare them to the consistent, culture monster French, and they play very sub-par by comparison. The Frenchies nice 2 unique unit's open up an an interesting window of extended opportunity too.....

 

[beholder2]

Greeks > * for early rush IMHO

 

[lynxxyarly]

Do brutes cost gold to upkeep and can they upgrade to anything?

They contribute to maintenance. They can also be upgraded to swordsmen etc. The good thing though is getting extra units and deleting them for extra gold. Bismark is crazy good since you don't have to focus on units early and get those nice wonders instead

 

[KAuss]

If you build 2 cities, your 2nd city should spit out units until you are saturated anyways... Always build wonders in the cap after your first wonder tech...

Does the brute sell for more than what Songhai gets outright? Cause on marathon, 75G x 3 = 225G and that's quite a bit compared to 60G for workers if that's what brutes sell for...

I do agree it's good to have more scouts tho, cause they get first dibs on barb camps with the honor policy for a snowball effect... But how I do hate having more units to move in the early parts of the game on marathon because the first techs are like 50+ turns away LOL... I want to just move my 2 units and get my first techs right away LOL...

 

[comatosedragon]

So far, my best game has been with Persia. Those longer golden ages may not seem like much, but the amount of money you can make from them is INSANE. Just remember to focus on happiness as much as possible (even to the point of skimping on culture producing buildings) and make sure you are trading your extra luxuries to the AI. Also, if you can time your wars to take place during your golden age, you'll be better off still what with extra movement. You should also try to time your first Great Person to be born during or right before your first (or second; first might be too hard) Golden age, then use him to extend . . . I was able to ride out a 54 turn Golden Age using good timing (and a little luck). And as I said, the gold you rake in from these golden ages should allow you to run with just about any strategy you want after the AD's.